


let me hold you tonight

by hereforthehurts



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Father-Daughter Relationship, FebuWhump2021, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Moonfam, Parent Ethari (The Dragon Prince), Parent Runaan (The Dragon Prince), Rayla Needs a Hug (The Dragon Prince), Runaan is Bad at Feelings (The Dragon Prince), Sick Character, Sickfic, Soft Runaan (The Dragon Prince), Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 00:55:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29584782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hereforthehurts/pseuds/hereforthehurts
Summary: In a timeline where Runaan is freed from the coin and gets reunited with his family - Rayla is sick, Ethari tries his best to keep them together, and Runaan is trying to make senses that everything has changed.
Relationships: Ethari & Rayla & Runaan (The Dragon Prince), Ethari & Rayla (The Dragon Prince), Ethari/Runaan (The Dragon Prince), Rayla & Runaan (The Dragon Prince)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 48





	1. patience

**Author's Note:**

> For febuwhump day 20; betrayal !! Moonfam time babey
> 
> Context: Runaan is freed from the coin, the war had more or less subsided, and Rayla is back at Silvergrove with Runaan and Ethari. Also, Rayla's original parents died from being imprisoned in the coin for too long <3 ouch . Enjoy !

“You’re sick.”

“Am not.”

  
Runaan sighs in exasperation as Rayla rolled further away from him on her bed, covering her head with her blankets in order to hide from him. There’s pain in his chest, the kind of parental pain for the girl in front of him that he hasn’t felt in a long time. Or maybe he’s felt every day. Runaan still has problems trying to comprehend time these days, let alone his feelings.

He knows that everything between them has been off since… well, since what felt like _forever,_ really—but it never really dawned on him that the girl would be hiding something as bad as a flu from them. Not his Rayla.

“Rayla, please. You’re acting like a child.”

Rayla looked up from her blankets angrily. “I _am_ a child.”

“I…”

  
_She is. She is a child._

  
He sighs softly, melting back into the guilt and regret that’s been looming over him since he first left Rayla in his mission. “Yes, you are.”

“Please leave,” she mumbles, hiding back under her blankets. “I’ll just sleep it off. I’ll be fine.”

“Okay.” Runaan slowly walks out towards the door. He only looks back once, to watch Rayla lay in her bed still, unmoving. He wishes so badly that she would at least tell him what was wrong—but pushing things would only make it worse. Ethari had told him so.

“Just… if you need anything, I’ll be around.”

Silence was all he got.

  
  


It was probably all that he deserved, too.

* * *

“Patience, love,” Was all that Ethari had said when he’d spilled all his worries on him over dinner. “We messed things up quite terribly with her, after all. It takes time.”

“How long?” Runaan sighs. “This isn’t… this isn’t the Rayla I remembered. This isn’t how I remembered us at all.”

“You’re right. It isn’t,” His husband agrees. “She’s been through a lot since the last time _you_ remembered, hasn’t she?”

“I suppose.” He slumps on the dinner table, rubbing his eyes tiredly. “I just… I just don’t know how we’d ever make it up to her, ‘Thari.”

“To be honest, Runaan, we probably never will.”

  
Silence fills in the room.

  
“You’re right,” Runaan sighs. “Bloody hell, you’re right.”

“Hey,” Ethari says, sharp but gentle, “it’s going to be okay.”

“It’s not, though,” he tells him. “Rayla is fully ours, now, and we—we can’t even take care of her better than when she wasn’t.”

“Then we try, Runaan,” His husband says softly. “It’s the only reasonable option, isn’t it?”

“And what if we fail? Again? What if we—” Runaan falters at all the possibilities that might happen next. “We fucked things up so badly with her that she won’t even talk to us anymore, now. I just… I don’t want to hurt her more than I already had.”

He remembers the time when Rayla had been seven, small and reckless. He and Ethari had been keeping all eyes and ears on her as if she might disappear and hurt herself any time—which she might. He remembered catching her in his arms when she fell from the highest three in Silvergrove, scolding her for not being careful.

 _“What if I hadn’t gotten lucky and caught you?”_ He had frowned and asked her.

Rayla shrugs and innocently says, _“I know you would.”_

 _“But what if I hadn’t?”_ He presses on. _“What if, somehow, I missed and you got hurt?”_

 _“But you wouldn’t,”_ Rayla just says. _“You’re invincible.”_ _  
_ _  
_ _“Rayla,”_ He sighs softly. _“I’m not invincible, little one. I’m not. I may miss, or make mistakes, or get scared, just like you. If you fall, and I don’t catch you, what would happen then?”_

 _“I’d… get hurt,”_ the small girl thinks for a moment, _“but that’s okay.”_

_“It’s not. I’d never forgive myself if anything happens to you.”_

_“Well, I would.”_ She smiles, with all the childhood innocence in the world. _“I’d forgive you, Runaan. I’d love you no matter what.”_

And she did. Rayla always had loved him.

“Fuck. I just—” Runaan seethes—he’s angry, angry at himself, angry at what had happened in the battle, in the war. “I’m not good enough for her, ‘Thari.”

“That’s not true,” Ethari says softly. “We just made mistakes. _Really_ terrible ones. And she’ll forgive us, if we all try. It takes time.”

“I know,” He nods. _Time, time._ He’s heard it a thousand times. “I know.”

“Rayla would wait forever for us. She has, in fact. Would we?”

Runaan swallows back his tears. “Of course.”

“Then we’re okay.”

_Okay. They were okay._

Runaan repeats those words over and over in his head as he tries to believe it.

* * *

He’s already up and running the second he wakes up to Rayla calling for him.

The calls turned into screams when Runaan got to the corridors of their house, his footsteps thumping loudly against the quiet of the night. His whole body seized up, scared and anxious as he forced himself to call back for her. “I’m coming, Rayla,” he yells, slamming her bedroom door open to find her hunching on the side of her bed, her chest heaving. “Hey, hey, _hey—”_

 _“Dad,”_ she sobs when she sees him. “Dad, I’m sorry—”

“Shhhh, hey,” he tugs her body into his arms and presses his forehead against hers. Her skin was hotter than it had been before when he checked on her. _Shit_. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m here. I’m here.”

“No, no you don’t—you don’t understand,” Rayla tries to tell him between her shaking breaths, “I—betrayed the others and the—”

“Rayla, _Rayla—_ it’s just a dream. A terrible one, but it won’t hurt you, okay? It’s okay. Breathe.” Runaan mutters, softly rocking her. “I’m here, little one. I’ve got you.”

“ _Is she okay?”_ Ethari mouths, placing a hand on his other knee that’s not supporting Rayla. _“Still not well?”_

“ _No,”_ Runaan shook his head in response, _“but I’ve got her.”_

His husband just smiles. _“I know you do.”_

  
  


The night was long for all three of them, but Ethari had been ready as ever, even though it had been a long while since they had the same domesticity. 

“It’s been a quite a moment since we had this kind of scare, isn’t it?” He whispers to Runaan when he placed back the cold washcloth on Rayla’s forehead gently. “It’s kind of… nice.”

Runaan raises his brows in amusement. “Nice?”

“Well, not _nice,”_ he shrugs, “but look. It’s… us, again.”

“Us,” Runaan sighs, looking down to the girl in his arms. “Yeah. It _is_ us.”

  
And Runaan never says the words _I love you_ first. Not ever. It was always his husband or Rayla first, pulling out the soft side of him out of his repressed shell of an assassin. But tonight… tonight would be different. He doesn’t want to wait another series of near-death adventures for him to tell his little girl what was obvious.

“I love you.”

And that was enough. It was enough, for tonight.

  
  
  
  



	2. forgiven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wrote this for febuwhump day 26; recovery !! A very requested fic i hope y'all like the ending of it :-]

Rayla never sleeps well when something’s wrong.

  
  
  


Runaan knows this from the first time her parents had left to guard the dragon—she was four, then, and had been a sad, whiny little thing. He doesn’t blame her. She was so young—too young to know what was happening outside of the little town she’s always been in, too young to understand why her parents had left her for good.

So, the only logical response that she had was to cry.

And _spirits_ did she cry. She wouldn’t eat, wouldn’t sleep, and _definitely_ wouldn’t go to bath (her fear of water was something both Runaan and Ethari quickly took a note of). And none of them know what to do—they’ve never handled children before! It had been an excruciating week of crying and comforting and not sleeping when a letter from her parents came.

Runaan remembers the next thing they did so clearly in his head. Ethari reads the two-page letter out loud to them. Rayla was in his lap, listening intently despite not really knowing what the letter had said. When his husband was done reading, Rayla stared at him for a long while with wide eyes before reaching for the letters and then burying her face in it.

  
  
  
  


She fell asleep for the first time in a week clutching that letter in her hand.

  
  
  


Rayla liked hugs, they found out quickly—so the next time she was upset, it had been easier for them. All that they needed to do was to wrap their arms around her for the longest time and let her sob everything out. And then she’d be okay. It was the simplest thing in the world.

  
  
  
  


Runaan just wished it would have been as simple  _ this  _ time.

  
  
  


But it’s not. It’s not since he went on that mission, not since he involved Rayla into the war—god,  _ why _ did fucking involve her into the war? She’s fifteen! His own very first mission had been when he was eighteen. She was too young.  _ Too young. This was all his fault. _

“It is. We made mistakes. We did terrible things. There’s no denying that,” Ethari tells him softly, over and over again. “ _ I  _ made that mistake.”

“What… what did  _ you  _ do?” Runaan asks quietly.

“I let the town ghost her,” Ethari looks down. “And when she came back for me, I—I ignored her, for a moment. And then I let her go again.”

“You didn’t… you couldn’t have done anything about it anyway, ‘Thari.”

“I could have done  _ something,”  _ he tells him, “I could have made her stay, and protect her.”

“She probably thinks that I hated her.”

“She probably does.” Ethari nods, squeezing his hands gently. “The least we could do is tell her that we don’t. That we love her. It seems like the most reasonable thing to do, isn’t it?”

“It is.” Runaan squeezes his hand back. 

Comfortable silence rests between them.

  
  


“Hey. I love you.”

Ethari smiled. “Huh. You’ve never said it first before.”

“Well,” he shrugs, smiling back, “things change, don’t they?”

“Yes. They do.”

  
  
  
  


He only hoped that it was for the better.

  
  


* * *

  
  
  


Rayla sleeps, most of the time.

  
  


Runaan stays by her side, only moving to stretch and eat. He doesn’t dare to leave her side. Not again.

  
  


The girl clings to his arm like it was her lifeline, murmuring in her feverish sleep. Runaan holds her just a little bit closer.

  
  


  
  
  


That night, he woke up to her crying in her sleep, eyes shut tightly. Ethari was already awake on her other side, sitting up to comfort her. It had been a habit they fell into since Rayla had gotten sick, ever since she was a little girl. 

  
  


And that was…

  
  
  


So long ago.

  
  
  


“Hold her,” Ethari whispers, caressing her cheek softly while tears streamed down. “I’ll wet the washcloth and be right back.”

“Hey,  _ hey _ ,” Runaan wakes up, shifting carefully, “Rayla, sweetheart. Wake up. ‘S okay, you’re alright.”

She murmurs something out—he didn’t quite catch it, but she sounded so… scared. And sad. If his heart could physically rip into two, it would.

“Hey. Come on, wake up. Rayla, wake up.” He taps on his cheek softly. “Come on. I’m right here, Ray. I’m here. You’re alright.”

Rayla’s eyes shot open, frowning deeply, holding back a sob. For a moment her eyes were full of fear—he knows, because that’s what he sees when he looks at the eyes of the people he’s hunted down before. He knows. And it hurts him even more to see it in his little girl’s eyes, in his Rayla’s eyes.

“Hey. Hey, look, I’m here. You’re safe. You’re okay.” Runaan wipes away the tears pooling on her eyes. “Shhhhh. Come here. You want to tell me what’s wrong?”

Rayla swallows thickly. “You—you fought me.”

  
  
  


_ Oh. _

  
  


He nods instead. “I did, Rayla.”

“And—and you—you were going to hurt me, and my friends, and—”

“I did, Rayla. I did.” He shushes her softly, pulling the girl closer while her whole body shook, murmuring other things he couldn’t bear to listen to. “I’m so sorry that I did, sweetheart. I’m so sorry.”

“They hurt me.”

“They did.”

“And they ghosted me, and ‘Thari left me.”

“He did. He’s so sorry that he did, sweetheart.”

“And I’m  _ angry _ ,” she sobs into his shirt instead, grasping on them tightly like she always does when she was a child. “And scared, and—and I want you to love me like you used to, but I don’t know what to do—”

“ _ Oh _ , Rayla, did you think that… that we didn’t love you?” Runaan asks her sadly. His heart breaks into two all over again, even more when he feels Rayla nod against his chest. “I’m sorry we made you think like that, Rayla. And a thousand sorries would never fix everything that happened, but—I am. I am sorry. And I love you.”

“You do?” Her voice was small when he asked him.

“I do. I do, of course I do—how could I not? You’re my Rayla,” His voice breaks again when he says it. “My sweet, little Rayla.”

“You used to call me that,” She murmurs sleepily.

“I do,” Runaan smiles. A tear escapes the brim of her eyes. “I’m sorry I stopped.”

“You never stopped loving me, though, right?”

“No,” he nods. “I never do.”

“I never do, either.”

  
  
  


  
  


Ethari came back moments later, a small basin on his hands. From the look in his eyes, Runaan knows he does it on purpose.

_ “You’re a nuisance,”  _ He mouthed jokingly, cradling the sleeping Ray lain his arms.  _ “You could’ve helped, you know.” _

_ “It doesn’t look like you need any,”  _ His husband smiles softly, placing the cold washcloth on his daughter’s burning forehead. Ethari combs his fingers through Rayla’s sweat-plastered bangs before saying,  _ “Maybe an “I love you” was all that she needed to hear, after all.” _

Runaan nods.  _ “Maybe.”  _

_ “Hey,”  _ he presses a kiss on his temple gently.  _ “We’ll be okay.” _

_ “Oh, I know we will.” _

  
  
  
  


This time, Runaan doesn’t doubt it one bit.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHOOH these three have much more talking to do but .... . . They'll be okay . Bcs they love each other . And in the end, it's all that matters :-]

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like Runaan's love for Rayla is much more complicated and complex than what's shown on the show. And ofc .. . . There's always an unspoken obligation for me to write character study fics for the Kids Who Had To Grow Up Too Fast Because Of War™ trope lol .
> 
> [tumblr blog!](https://hereforthehurts.tumblr.com/)


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